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ZQuotes
Reflections on the Meaning of Life
and the Nature of this Universe
(In the spirit of the free exchange of information)
"The Soul is the very essence of existence, whereas the Spirit is the Energy of Life."
"The key to succesfully making life decisions is knowing just where your priorities lie."
"If there is one person in this world you can really trust, it is yourself."
"The only person in this world that you can always trust is yourself."
"There's only one way to get something done, and that's to do it. So quit procrastinating and just do it."
"If Humans look for understanding of the Universe and of Life, they will find it. However, the Truth is not as glorious as one might imagine, but rather very depressing and pointless. Humans must accept Life as it is and try to Believe, even in a false hope, for by the Human Will alone anything can be possible, even that which cannot or does not otherwise exist in this barren and cruel Universe."
"If you lose sight of God, then you lose sight of Hope."
"I have partaken of the Immortal Chalice; the draught was utterly putrid. And now, having sipped the cup of mortality, I thirst no more."
"Immortality...such a waste of Life!"
"Fate is a book; every man writes his chapter with the ink of his life."
"The best things that happen in life are those that have not been planned and cannot be anticipated."
"Skill is experience, not instinct."
"The path behind me is a long one; the path ahead, longer still."
"I care not how I look, the only thing that matters is how I feel."
"I used to desire to be a Constant, one who sacrifices his humanity and his mortality for the power to fulfill the sole and lonely purpose of protecting all life and existence. Now, I regretfully discover that I am one."
(Followup) "And now, looking back, I realize that my most greatest moment was when I discovered that I am just human after all..."
"I once tried to change society, but in the end, I was shunned by it."
"You can accomplish nothing alone, except that which will affect only you."
"If asked where I get the inspiration for my quotes, I would respond with a single word: life. The subjects I articulate are already there, I have just found a way to express them verbally."
"Nothing outshines the inner beauty of a person who is pure."
"We can never be content with what we have; there is always something more... Maybe that's what life is about. But then again, that may be the force that keeps us going..."
"Society's main function is to give rights and protection to the weak and those who are less deserving."
"I find that there is an extreme lack of perfect people in this world..."
"It all depends on which direction the little white box moves when you pull the lever..."
"The soul must be purged before it can at last become pure."
"You must tread the path of darkness before reaching the city of light."
"A person reaches perfection not when he is the best, but only as long as he strives to be the best he can possibly be."
"Have you ever been in love? Do you know how it feels? Well, isn't that reason enough to keep searching?"
"You can never fully understand something until you experience it yourself."
"It's not so much that I have too much free time, but that I spend too much of my time freely."
"The most powerful force is clarity of mind and singularity of purpose: that...is focus."
"There exist two worlds in this universe. One is the real world, the other is the perceived world. Though the human organism is affected by changes in the real world, every person exists in his/her own perceived world, a projection of the human mind."
"If there is one thing in this universe that is absolutely certain, it is the magnificent power of the human mind."
"to make complexity out of life, most people don't realize that life is already complex..."
"To represent a group of people, the hardest yet most important thing to do is to remember to represent what the people want, not what you want..."
"Make your sacrifices now, and victory will come later."
"We all have a destiny that we must follow. However, we don't follow it because we have to, but rather because we want to, and that's what makes it our destiny..."
"It's like deja vu. When you have deja vu, every movement you make over a period of a few seconds feels familiar, like you've done it before. In some cases, you can even predict exactly where you should be moving next, since the memory of the experience is already present within your mind. Sometimes, you can change your actions from your prediction, but then the deja vu just ends. Most times, however, you just follow out the plan without a second thought, as if you have no control over your actions."
"Human society: it is not going anywhere, it is just getting more complex, exactly like our knowledge of the Universe."
"War is a condition of the human spirit. As long as we have values, we will have wars."
"The hardest thing in the world is trying to make a girl happy..."
"When you're looking to the sky for answers, you have to watch out because it is too easy to trip over a stone beneath you."
"Love is the most incredible emotion known to man, yet it is also the most painful."
"Love is a drug. It intoxicates a person and distorts his/her common sense. Once you've had it, you'll do anything to get more of it. And losing it is the hardest thing to get through."
"Hope is the most incredible and most unbelievable of human emotions."
"Every member of humankind seeks to control some form of that Divine power: the power of creation."
"The most beautiful and most elusive force in human nature is true love: it is a gift from Heaven, and yet it still has not been proven to exist."
"Living in a perfect world without flaw would be boring and devoid of meaning. Even as the world is troubled, it is these troubles that define our perception of pleasure."
"Darkness is defined by light. However, the reverse does not hold true."
"What you say is not so important as what they hear."
"To stand before the threshold of dawn; to bid farewell to the fleeting darkness; to lift thine eyes to the sky and stretch thine arms out toward the heavenly glow of the Morning Star. This...this is the ultimate goal toward which every soul pines through earthly torment..."
"Life itself is a gift. No wonder it is such a strain to release your grasp when your time to live has reached its end."
"Information is as pure or as deadly as the mind of the person who possesses it."
"What happens when a mortal man who is shunned by civilization becomes a genius and unlocks the ultimate secrets of space and time and acquires the Godlike power of creation? I have no idea, but I sure as hell intend to find out!"
"Like the Moon orbiting the Earth, I lie in seclusion from the world and yet am much too close to bask in the glow of the heavenly stars."
"A wise vampire once said, 'the sun is evil!!!'"
"Love is such sweet poison."
"A great sorceror may be able to deceive your eyes, but he cannot deceive his own presence.
"At the tone, the time will be...now."
"Experiencing pain is better than experiencing nothing at all."
"Believe in yourself, and only then can others start believing you."
"If you love a person because of who they truly are, not because they make you happy, I think that may be much closer to true love."
"Impure love is a feeling. Pure love is a bond."
"People are not born soulmates, they become soulmates."
"The 'sensation' of love is a very deceptive thing. In fact, it's a drug. It feels great, you get addicted to it, but once its gone, you find yourself in withdrawal, full of pain, but even after the effects of the drug are gone, you're still left with an emptiness that can only be filled with more of the drug."
"My name is Destruction. I have come from beyond the Void to Devour the Weave of Existence and return your Universe to the Purity of Nothingness."
"What is the difference between friendship and love you ask? Well, friendship is merely a convenience, while love is a commitment."
"An error made once is a mistake. An error made twice is carelessness. An error made three times is failure."
"Do not be ashamed of your mistakes...but, do learn from them."
"If you're gonna take a fall, you might as well take it with style!"
"I expect to find my place sometime in the future, when I'm a hermit living in the countryside of Japan in traditional fashion, developing my personal new form of martial arts, and seeking wisdom and enlightenment through the surrounding nature of my home. That's the kind of life I wish to lead..."
"Innocence will always be punished by experience."
"Ah yes, to watch otaku bash anime is a truly unique spectacle indeed!"
"Feeling left out. And feeling that that is my place. That's the story of my life."
"As the alchemist shouts in his laboratory 'I will create gold!', I shall shout into the sky 'I will achieve perfection!'"
"Science is my religion."
"Life: You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave."
"In a perfect relationship, you must place just as much importance in yourself as your partner; no more, and no less."
"It's worthless to try to change yourself to suit other people. Noone is more important than yourself. There may be people that are just as important, but without you, you truly have noone."
"Knowledge alone is not power. You must have the strength to use it."
"Knowledge alone is not power. You must have the strength to use it, and the wisdom to wield it well."
"Simply knowing cannot and will not open doorways, it lies in the choice of the enlightened to choose to act upon the knowledge that he gains, and only by becoming strong and dedicated can a learned man become powerful and wise."
"Ignorance is the first step toward confusion."
"One who would understand, must not be ignorant."
"There's no time to regret decisions made in the past. There is only time to reflect upon one's poor choices and use that wisdom to guide the future."
"If I felt no pain in life, I'd know no pleasure."
"Even after you've mastered the equation, as soon as you change the constants, you become powerless."
"I may spend all my life thinking and pondering the meaning of things, but you are infinitely wiser than I, for you know how to live..."
"The purpose of life is...to be truly happy."
"Independance has nothing to do with being alone. To be independant means to be able to function as an individual among others."
"Life is much too special to experience alone."
"A memory will only remain vivid as long as it is renewed frequently."
"Hope - that is the most powerful force in human nature, for it shines brightest when the situation is darkest."
"Life is like a Chinese finger trap: the more you struggle to understand it, the more complicated it gets..."
"Wisdom is useless to the ignorant."
"Only crazy people are content with their existence."
"Time makes the impossible possible."
"Here are the dice. I can't predict what you'll end up with, but I can tell you this: you won't get anywhere unless you roll the dice."
"Time is change, and change is the tool of Chaos. Thus, in a world where Time flows relentlessly on, Order will forever be a shortlived virtue."
"It's so much easier to laugh at your mistakes with friends, than to hide them and feel ashamed."
"No blade is sharper than the piercing tongue of shame."
"This is the secret to understanding the meaning of life: The Universe would still exist, if life did not."
"And so, the journey will continue, as I endlessly advance toward a distant goal that I know does not exist, though I exhibit my very own human ignorance which I despise so much in order to block out that realization, so that I can fool myself into thinking I actually have somewhere to go..."
"What is Good and Evil? The human soul cannot exist without hate. But there are those who can control their hate, those who can control their anger...and those who cannot."
"In life, the simplest of matters are always the most important."
"The first thing you must realize is that the human mind is a greater force of deception than it is a force for understanding."
"Don't think inside the box. In fact, don't even think outside the box. I am asking you to think between the box."
"The chaos of life...perhaps that is the true perfection..."
"Everything in this Universe can be explained, understood, and expressed in terms that allow for the ultimate manipulation of existence."
"I think love is the sun. We'd all be cold and dead without it, but there are few who can embrace it whole-heartedly without getting burned. Once you've felt its warm glow, all you need to do is glance at it and you know it's there, and you know what it is, but if you try to stare at it directly, your eyes will become blinded with confusion."
"'Know Thyself.' There is no greater wisdom."
"Hatred imprisons the soul. Those who hate cannot be truly free."
"Thirst is pain. But drinking is pleasure. One could not exist without the other. Surely, thirst would bear no pain to one who needs not drink. And just the same, no pleasure could be derived from drinking from one who does not thirst. The key to perfection is not eliminating the thirst, not eliminating the need to drink, but perpetuating the cycle into infinity."
"Time flows faster as you grow older."
"What you have is meaningless. What you do with it is what's important."
"One thing you have to learn in life is that you'll never have enough time to do everything."
"The most important thing is to be satisfied with your life and with who you are. Only then can you be truly happy."
"The sun itself is a paradox. The sun gives us light, though if you look straight into the sun, it will blind you. From the death of stars rises the birth of planets. Sunlight cultivates life, but get too close and it will incinerate all life."
"Time is but a pond of events, and the future is nothing more than a reflection of the past..."
"Do not underestimate the ability for a human to accomplish his/her goals. Too many people do this and end up depressed and with little confidence in their own abilities. This attitude gets you nowhere."
"Religion and morals give hope to those who cannot see the simple joy in life, yet also religion does countless times blind and imprison the believer, to the point where the believer cannot perceive his own imprisonment, and thus he loses complete freedom..."
"Expect too much, and you will be disappointed by what isn't there. Expect nothing, and you will appreciate what *is* there."
"Plato's Allegory of the Cave: I feel like a man who seeks for the light of truth, but in every instance of scrutinization, the other prisoners of the cave reject my line of inference, labeling me as a disturber of the peace by trying to reach beyond those shadows that haunt my dreams, and are a part of each and every one of our lives. Will I ever escape the darkness of the cave??? Or perhaps the more pertinent question is, who will escape with me?"
"The line between genius and madness may be fine, but it is very distinct."
"There is a distinct difference between rock and metal. Rock is organic, fashioned from the earth; it is solid, and yet it is vulnerable to the changing tides of erosion. Metal is stressed through force, sheer and tough, fashioned from the fires of man, and malleable to fit varied molds. Rock and Roll can never be metal, and Heavy Metal can never be rock."
"It's no excuse to put words in my mouth, that there aren't any already there."
"Eating six inches of a Subway sandwich is one of the hardest things anyone could ever do. Once you plow through one half of that footlong beauty, you're on such a natural high and that other half of a sandwich is sitting there staring back at you, saying "I'm delicious! Eat me!" How can you resist that???"
"The wise man is at first silenced by the study of logic, for he realizes that all the arguments he has been capable of are useless."
"A wise man accepts his flaws with the desire to overcome them. An arrogant man denies his own flaws, claiming to have wisdom."
"That is the key to understanding the basic structure of this universe, which is an essential step on the path to becoming gods (which may not be your goal for humanity, but it is mine)."
"Politics is a waste of life and time."
"I don't have the answer yet, but I do remember the question now."
"There is no God. We might as well play him, because noone else will."
"If you expect nothing from life, then every little thing you get will be like the greatest gift."
"You can't change the past. And you can't predict the future. But the present becomes the past and also shapes the future. Having the ability to control the present is not as easy as it sounds, but those who can, control time."
"Love starts with a feeling, pleasant and unexpected, but not resented. It then moves into confusion and obsession, and does not always survive this stage. If it does, then it evolves into an oversurgance of euphoria. Over time, love begins to decay, it withers and eventually becomes rotten. It stains your heart and leaves you hurt and broken, until another one comes along. Then, the cycle repeats. Learn it, live it, breathe it, but do not despise it. For love, as great and as grim as it can be, is nevertheless a powerful force indeed, and is often times an inspiration to us all."
"Have you ever made a promise that you figured out only too late you could never keep? The feeling of wanting to honor that promise, yet knowing that you never can, that having made the promise in the first place was a mistake, but it's too late to change that now... You can do naught but stand by and watch the heart shatter and explode. The all-to-late realization of the inevitability of doom is a troubling thing indeed."
"Break On Through isn't just a song, it's a state of mind."
"Wanna get away with murder? Join the army."
"My one vice is my own shadow. And the fact that I so often hide behind it."
"The art of seeing the whole: if you look at just one branch, you miss out on the beauty of the entire tree, rippling like water in the breeze."
"The afterlife is an excuse. Those who trust in the promise of an afterlife are really giving up on the promises of this life, yet without losing belief in them. To believe in the beauty of afterlife is nothing more than a way of believing you will still experience that beauty, but without making the effort to create it in this world. In the end, it is nothing more than a delusion people use to brighten a dull life where dreams never hatch."
"You gotta break a lotta hearts before you find one worth protecting."
"You must be a sado-masochist to enjoy love."
"Pain is by far the greatest source of inspiration."
"Sometimes I wish I could live in my dreams. Other times, I don't need to sleep because life is already a dream."
"Democracy is just tyranny of the majority."
"Humans don't live in the present, they live in the past and the future; every waking moment is either wasted in fruitless efforts at survival, else it is spent pining for lost worlds and drifting into dreams disguised as the future..."
"Beginning, end, good, evil, meaning, purpose...The mind projects countless fictitious entities onto the world, one must be careful not to let those instinctive concepts cloud one's judgement of the nature of things."
"Every path has a direction, but no path has an end."
"It is common human nature to burn potential like fuel."
"Life is a never-ending battle with one's own shadow."
"That which you despise is the source of what you love."
"Love has many flavors, and the sweetest one is as much a strength as it is a weakness."
"Everything has its converse; the only happy-medium is ignorance."
"Life is ruled by decay."
"If you want to know flying, you must first spend a lot of time stuck on the ground."
"Adaptation can be beneficial, but it is a blinding process."
"The Universe is constantly balanced in all matters."
"Lack of control results from lack of understanding."
"Love: The most powerful of human emotions. Love can be the growth of unlimited happiness, or it can be the source of limitless pain. Love can make a life, but it can also break a life."
"You can't always get what you need, but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you still get fucked over."
"Society caters to the majority, whilst crushing the individual."
"Morals are just a more convincing form of ethics."
"Truth and Faith are entirely separate entities. It is possible to have faith in something you do not believe."
"One question you must ask yourself is, if you were truly free, would you still be here?"
"Reality is a poison that gets in your system. You can't wash it out in the shower, and you can't hide from it in the dark. The best you can do is distract yourself from it momentarily, at best affording yourself a fleeting comfort."
"Keep your mind clear and free of thought, free of distraction. Keep your breath regular, but don't force it, it should be natural. Only in the silent void can the whisper of truth be heard."
"Desire, not possession, fuels life."
"Life is spent pursuing dreams. If you never see any of these dreams realized, then you become lost in despair and give up the hunt. If you see too many of these dreams realized, then you will forget the value of each one, and become blind to your fortune. Thus, to remain in balance is to spend your life relentlessly chasing after your dreams, only momentarily getting to experience one here and there, never long enough to get comfortable..."
"Though my voice is soft, my thoughts are loud."
"Life is all just a grand illusion, and you're fooling yourself if you think things are working out."
"Why should we lust after sparkly objects? And why should we be cut when grabbing them?"
"Knowing something and feeling it are different things: knowing something in your mind is not the same as knowing it in your heart. Knowing does not equal understanding."
"Life is a race against time. Your pace quickens as you grow older, but every day ends with the sun lapping you yet again."
"Wake up for the sunrise, and you feel privileged to get a head start on the day. Stay up for the sunrise, and you feel time has cheated you out of another day."
"The secret to life is hanging out with the right people."
"Life is a series of hills and valleys. Sometimes you're up, and sometimes you're down. But as long as you keep going, you'll never find yourself in either one for very long."
"The higher you fly, the farther you fall. But the farther you fall, the higher the rush you get when you bounce off the bottom."
"The existence of the future is the source of all hope."
"There are two kinds of apologies. The first occurs after you've realized that you've done something that you regret, and your apology is followed by a course of action leading to the atonement of that regretted action. The second occurs when you have a sense of regret for the way something is, but you have no control over it. What it is that compels you to apologize for that which is outside of your control I'm not sure, but often times it is a sense of sincere regret for the way things inevitably are, though to others it often comes off as being an insincere apology, since there is no action taken toward atoning for the regretted action or state of being."
"When you've got it, you've got it all. But you always seem to find some way to lose it. And once you've lost it, you're at the lowest of lows."
"Life is a series of coincidences, the meaning of which is the sum of all those coincidences which mean something to you."
"Life is wasted in the pursuit of dreams, rather than spent in the actualization of them."
"I grew up thinking that life is a game where you get to choose your character and then play. But lately I've realized that I've spent all my time searching for the right character, and I haven't even begun playing the game yet..."
"Feel the truth within your heart, understand what it is you require of life, then put all your energy into grasping it, and never let go or look back. Only once you've accomplished this, will the barriers between you and your dreams crumble to dust."
"Focus on the important things. Like what kind of person you want to be, not what kind of possessions you'd like to have."
"Don't let your shadow lead you. You will only plunge yourself into darkness of the mind and heart and soul."
"Life is already cruel and unforgiving. We might as well take adavantage of that to advance our own technology in the hope that someday we will be able to control our own quality of life, if such a thing is possible."
"If I could make a wish right now I would wish to break free from the chains that tie me down in life. To be able to run free, go anywhere I please and spend my time however I desire. That would be the greatest way to live. But I'm trapped here, plugged into the machine, constrained by society, and a prisoner of my own fears and insecurities... ... ..."
"If you take the time to set up the pieces, they'll scatter to chaos before they ever fall into place."
"From every dream one must soon awake."
"So simple are the dreams of youth, and yet, the older we get, the harder they are to grasp..."
"Will you let the emptiness consume you, or will you fight to fill it in?"
"I reached a point where I didn't have to worry about being me anymore, I could just be."
"Don't be yourself, just be."
"My philosophy on studying for finals: if you didn't get it the first time around, you ain't gonna get it at the last moment."
"You can't really call it a nightmare; the dream itself is quite pleasant. Indeed, it is not what is in the dream that's unsettling, but the fact that it is only a dream, and thus, it turns out that reality, not the dream, is in fact the nightmare..."
"What's the difference between a friend and a lover? A friend makes you laugh, while a lover makes you cry."
"At what point do you learn that the world doesn't stop when you go to bed, and start up again when you wake up? At what point do you realize that the world just keeps on going while you sleep, rolling on without you?"
"Remember the past. Prepare for the future. But live in the present."
"Ascension is only as difficult as each individual step you climb."
"Enlightenment is a process, not a goal."
"You remain victorious only so long as you continue to fight at the best of your abilities."
"We're all lost in a sea of people. If you don't keep rowing, you'll end up drifting away from the ones who are most important to you."
"For the person who is happy, life is a self-fulfilling prophecy."
"Losing is a privilege - it gives you one more thing to gain."
"The only perfect days are yesterday and tomorrow."
"The only way to climb out of a ditch is to crawl down and push off the bottom."
"You must learn to take nothing for granted."
"The only one who can teach you is yourself."
"Noone can give you answers, at best they can only show you the right questions."
"Depression is a lack of hope during the time you need it most."
"The only true freedom lies in death."
"I have a deep and abiding respect for the three pillars of human thought: math, physics, and philosophy - the Trinity of Man. Math, for its ability to create a language of logically self-consistent entities out of pure thought; physics, for its ability to use math to explain the fundamental properties of nature; and philosophy, successful or not, for tackling the more personal question of what is consciousness, which can neither be qualified nor quantified by physics or math."
"Take off your mask. Break your chains. Shatter the image. Free yourself."
"For a long time I thought 'hypocrite' was a meaningless term. We are all hypocrites, because we tend to think in terms of perfect ideals, while the world is far from perfect. But the distinction lies in the understanding of this key fact. Some people understand the limitations of the real world, and modify their beliefs accordingly. Other people unconditionally profess their faith in certain truths that are blatantly false in this world. These people are hypocrites."
"The force of revolution is strong, because it occurs out of necessity."
"It is not man's place to judge himself. A man who constantly judges himself is a man who is afraid of his own beliefs. It is imperative to a healthy self-conscious to be certain of your beliefs, and to let God be the judge. If you are right, God will reward you with success. If you are wrong, then God will punish you with failure. But if you take it upon yourself to determine the righteousness of your own actions, then you will forever be stuck philosophizing, rather than revolutionizing the world."
"If you focus on the end, the means becomes meaningless. If you focus on the means, you'll never reach the end."
"Life is a spiral staircase. We inevitably end up walking in circles. But not without experiencing Ascension."
"A philosopher's life is difficult, for a philosopher tends to ask the questions the common man fears to answer."
"Hell is not a place that exists in some realm of space. Hell is very personal - it exists within your mind."
"Demons are just the shadows of your thoughts - the strongest are cast by your brightest dreams."
"Stand not too tall in the bright light, for your shadow looms sinister behind you."
"When things work, we tend not to question them, yet as soon as they fall apart, we demand to understand why, in the hope that we will discover that the cause for the breakdown is avoidable in future trials. It is in this way that we learn from our mistakes. The wiser man is the one who has made more mistakes, and has learned from them. We desire not to understand why the universe works the way it does, so much as to understand why it does not work other ways. Where there lies a cleft between vision and reality, curiosity paves the road for technology. And thus it is clear that the ultimate purpose of technology is to turn pure thought into objective reality."
"Pleasure and terror are equally exciting; they merely have slightly different effects on the mind and body."
"Which is better: determined efforts or a miracle? Success requires a healthy dose of each."
"The only trouble with elderly wisdom is that vision is clouded by memory. Life was never really as good as you remember it, and it'll never really be as good as you imagine it will be. There is no other day but today. And time is not your friend."
"My mistake, thus far, has been believing that humans are meant to be happy."
"I've determined that the purpose of human life is not to find happiness. If we were destined to be happy, then we would be much simpler creatures. No, there is another purpose for us complicated beings. We have intelligence for a reason, and it doesn't help us to be happy."
"Your physical form gives shape to your dreams, but also obstructs the light of your dreams, casting the shadows which are the demons in your thoughts. In a perfect world, your body would be transparent, unable to cast shadows, but it would also be shapeless, and unable to give form to your dreams. Dreams and demons - they are forever entwined, and one cannot exist without the other."
"Don't believe anything anyone ever tells you about life. Noone can be told what life is like. You have to live it for yourself."
"It's true, love never dies. It just rots."
"Love is not the rose covered in thorns, it is the poison concealed by the wildberry's sweet and juicy texture."
"A man fully intending to keep his promises must be very careful when making them."
"He who has known failure, knows then how not to fail."
"An open mind wasted is better than a wasted mind closed."
"Pleasure is nothing more than the all-too-fleeting comfort of running away from pain."
"One who is prisoner to a dream, can be freed only by a dream."
"A fool is wise, and a wise man is a fool. One who is truly wise recognizes that there is no wisdom."
"The truth hurts sometimes, but it's still better than being lied to."
"The day doesn't end, it just resets every 24 hours."
"You taught me the meaning of choice. Just because you *can* do something doesn't mean you *have* to do it. There will always be people who can do what you can do (and even those who can do it better than you can). The important thing is to choose to do what you truly want to do, because the one and only thing you have to contribute is the fact that you are yourself, and nobody else has that. So make your mark upon the world, in just the way that you want."
"Those who get it, take it for granted. Those who know just how much they need it, never get it."
"We live our entire lives as slaves. From the moment of conception we are slaves to the womb. At birth we are released from that prison, but the umbilical cord is immediately replaced with chains. We are chained slaves, and society is our master. Most people get used to being slaves, and become so fond of their chains that they would even fight to protect their master against any who would exhibit free behaviour which is not explicitly prescribed by society. Those who would fight the free, for the sake of protecting their own imprisonment, are lost, and they are the true enemy."
"Intelligent people are a dime a dozen, yet smart people are hard to find."
"If you know what you're looking for, you'll never find it."
"A person who is dissatisfied with imperfection will never be satisfied with life."
"I like proving to people that they don't know everything. Because people that think they know everything, when confronted with something outside their sphere of knowledge, inevitably get frustrated and either ignore or try to eliminate it. Nobody knows everything, and we all know things that other people don't know, so the only way to coexist is to be open and share our knowledge, receiving as well as giving. Take a chance sometime on believing that things might not be the way you think they are."
"Kids are naive. When you're a kid, you believe what adults tell you about life, thinking that they speak from experience. Then you grow up, and you slowly begin to realize that what the adults told you was totally wrong. And then you realize why they lied to you. It was because they wanted you to grow up believing in the good things, hoping that life would turn out better for you. Turns out adults are naive, too."
"It is human nature to take for granted what one has been given and not consciously earned."
"Time is money, but remember - you can give up all your time and make lots of money, but when your time is up, all the money in the world won't buy you another second."
"By taking on a job that you are not fully dedicated to, you are contributing only to the further decay of society. Let those do the job that can do it best, and do not suffer yourself to work half-assed at something you do not have passion for - you are helping no one, and hurting many."
"The beauty of this world is that it is seamless and whole. One who desires to emulate Creation must learn to hide the seams of that which is created."
"He who cares not whether there are any answers is a fool. He who seeks answers, believing they exist, is misguided. He who discovers that there are no answers, and therefore ceases to look for them, is also a fool. He who knows that there are no answers, but searches for them anyway, is a sage. Wisdom is an exercise in futility, but that is precisely why it is so valuable. Life itself is futile, but we live. And even a fool can see that life is beautiful."
"Trust, and be struck from behind. Hope, never to be satisfied. Love, and be hated in return. That's the way life works."
"In The Matrix, freedom is attained purely through the mind. In reality, a free mind enables you only to see the chains, it doesn't allow you to break them. A bird that understands flight is still unable to fly through the bars in its cage."
"Nothing in this world is original, and you can never accomplish anything that hasn't been accomplished before. But things are forgotten, even people are forgotten, yet the people you know will remember who you are and how you live your life."
"I want my gravestone to read: 'Life was a huge disappointment...but it wasn't a total waste.'"
"Don't rush to the top. If you had everything today, you'd be dead tomorrow."
"Just because the world is full of pain and suffering, doesn't mean you're not allowed to smile."
"Nature has optimized mankind for survival, not happiness."
"Hell is a twisted deformation of that which once was beautiful."
"If at once you come across paradise, beware."
"I like to question things that most people take for granted. It's refreshingly liberating. You'd be surprised how much you can learn from your own basic nature without force feeding it societal norms. The cost is a bit of cultural naivete, and ignorance of the sort of things many people do take for granted, but the rewards are well worth it."
"The only unopposed opinion is the one not voiced."
"If you desire to be beautiful, there will always be those who are more beautiful than you are. If you desire to be intelligent, there will always be those who are smarter than you are. If you desire to be skilled, there will always be those who are more talented than you are. So then, what, if anything, is it good to desire?"
"Desire breeds temptation. Temptation is a trap. A trap, once sprung, leads to collapse. If one is to build one's self up, one must learn to eliminate desire."
"Many people devise their own religions, and many gain followers. That's what cults are. And it's no surprise that most borrow ideas from existing religions. If you want to make your religion popular, you just need to rule an empire, force your people to convert, send out missionaries across the globe, and kill all the heretics."
"Having lived a life that has thus far been characterized by mental anguish, I am naturally intrigued by the pursuit of inner peace, and alternative methods of thinking that provide better ways to approach the stresses of life..."
"Desire is what separates you from what you can't have."
"Every night before you go to bed, you should ask yourself, 'what am I living for? Why should I wake up tomorrow and not just kill myself right now?' And you should be able to give yourself a concrete answer."
"In determining the purpose for your life, and what you should 'do' with your life, ask yourself, 'what do I have that people might want/need?' It can be a skill, a talent, a personality attribute, even an idea. It doesn't have to be original - your own unique personality will make it one of a kind. Note, the answer to this question will get you farther than the answer to the question, 'what do I want to be?' However, true happiness and success comes to people who enjoy doing what it is they have to give to people, or those who find a way to make people want whatever it is they enjoy doing."
"Most people that believe in God wouldn't admit that He doesn't exist. Many feel that to do so would undermine their very belief. I believe in fantasy, while recognizing it as such. That allows me to see through the illusion."
"The high road gives a better vantage point, but it's also easier to be seen."
"To sum up the human condition in one sentence: I live in my world, you live in yours - they both occupy the same space."
"It's so hard to find cool, smart people. I know plenty of people who are cool, but just plain stupid, in a number of ways. And I know a lot of people who are really smart, but just losers, plain and simple. You just can't find people that are cool and smart in this world."
"I never was interested in music you could dance to."
"It is no longer satisfactory simply to survive. Mankind desires...something more."
"Life is the Gambler's Ruin. You spend most of it at the loser's table, but every once in awhile, you catch a brief lucky streak. It is for those moments we play the game, though no sooner do we experience them than they are gone..."
"You may never accomplish your greatest dreams, but you will always remember your efforts to accomplish them."
"Seek out that which inspires you. Latch onto that which challenges you. Let go of that which holds you back."
"Possession is the point at which passion becomes obsession. it's a matter of control. Do you control the passion, or does the passion control you?"
"The key to accomplishing great things is accepting great challenges. You only get out what you put in, and you've got to take a risk every now and again."
"Music is a performance, even if it's an act. If you can't feel the music, then don't get on the stage."
"How much are you willing to sacrifice for that which matters most to you? Only after you've sacrificed everything save your passion, will your true talent be revealed."
"The key to understanding everything is understanding first that everything must be placed into context."
"We don't live to realize our dreams, we dream to enrich our lives."
"The main problem with my work ethic is that I believe that a job done half-assed, is much better off not done at all. That, simultaneously combined with the qualities of being both a perfectionist and a realist, oft leads me to conclude that most, in fact all, work is not even worth attempting."
"Distraction is the best medicine."
"The purpose of The Matrix was never to answer questions, its purpose was to ask them."
"The problem with the education system is that it tries to foster a desire for learning, but it doesn't teach us the things we really want to learn about. And they'll defend themselves by saying that the real purpose of education is to teach you to learn for yourself, but that's bullshit. Beyond the basics, like learning how to read and write, education is useless. I don't need somebody to tell me how to do research, or how to ask people questions. Learning is a natural product of curiosity. A person should actively seek out his/her education as the result of a specific desire to learn; that education should not be undesirably forced upon a person for the sake of cultural sophistication."
"It's easy to fall in love with a paradigm - to get stuck on it, to become obsessed with it - to the point where you can't think of anything else."
"The difference between science and religion is this: you cannot create a device that works on the power of God."
"Sometimes, it's the unexpected failures that are really the greatest successes."
"Figuring out where you're going is the first step to getting there."
"The most influential state in the union is the state of mind."
"I don't believe that anything happens for a reason, just that things happen, and the key is to realize what life is and is not, because it's easy to get confused about reality. Before you cry out for the feasts you were promised, ask yourself first, were you ever really promised any feasts?"
"The power of the Blues doesn't come from the lyrics. Blues lyrics are typically very ordinary. But just as it is regular human situations that can produce intense human emotions, it is the performer's emotional delivery of the song that makes it so powerful - he brings those ordinary lyrics to life and makes you feel that intensity even though you may not be in the same situation described by the lyrics."
"To think is to be aware of one's existence. A rock exists, but [presumably] does not know it exists, for it does not think."
"I am not motivated by a desire to get a job and raise a family because I don't buy the illusion that that's where happiness can be found."
"I find it quietly unnerving that the word 'revolution' is so closely related to the word 'revolve', which means 'to come full circle'. Makes you think about the true nature of revolutions."
"Jet Lag Syndrome - a chronic disorder which renders the body unable to adapt to a regular 24-hour circadian rhythm, even after long-term exposure to a single time zone. Insomniacs, nocturnals, victims of vampirism, and other persons who sleep during the day and wake at night, but do so with a regular pattern, are not necessarily suffering from jet lag syndrome."
"The only way out is through."
"Before you can write poetry, you have to learn the alphabet. Then, you'd better work on your vocabulary."
"The only thing anyone ever tells you about life that's true is that anything anyone ever tells you about life is a lie."
"Pursuing a dream is like climbing a mountain. And sometimes you can lose your grip on the rocks. And when you do, you go tumbling down the mountainside, into the shadowy valley below. Now, even after you have been resurrected, you must first climb from the depths of the ravine before you are able to ascend the higher peaks."
"We grow up with hopes and dreams, which become shattered, and then we raise the next generation, thinking that they'll succeed where we fail, so we tell them the world is full of hopes and dreams and they believe it, only to be disappointed, and the cycle repeats."
"Some people discover religion. I discovered the blues."
"People will tell you that your college years are the greatest years of your life, and then you'll go into college expecting it to be a blast - it will almost undoubtedly be a huge disappointment, and yet, a lot of times it turns out that those years are indeed the greatest years of your life, depressingly..."
"When the System fails you, you lose faith in the System. It's not about rebellion."
"Survival consists merely in successfully pushing out of mind the will to die."
"Everybody gets the blues - just in different shades."
"To know is not necessarily to understand."
"Only two things have any real productive value in life: hard work and inspiration."
"I've come a long way, but I haven't gotten anywhere."
"Organized religion is a spiritual plague upon mankind."
"Brains are overrated. What you need is charisma."
"A single insult carries more weight than a thousand compliments."
"Each generation is unequipped to raise the next generation."
"Your worst fears are the ones you take for granted, and don't even realize are there."
"You could be willing to do absolutely anything for a person's love - and they still might not give it to you. Such a thing is love."
"I see great beauty in things, and I love to take pictures, but rarely have I taken a picture that captures the true beauty of the subject being photographed."
"The brighter my dreams are, the darker my reality becomes."
"Beauty is a distraction from the ugliness of the modern world."
"There is no certainty. Of this we can be certain."
"Within every deception, there is some hint of truth."
"If one would understand the why, one must first understand the true nature of the what."
"When I look to the future, my sight is dimmed by an empty darkness. When I look to the past, my eyes are clouded by the blood of ancient wounds. When I look to the present, I see a slow and silent descent."
"I like working on computers, because machines can't judge you."
"Dreams would be empty, without images from waking life."
"I'm surrounded by people, but I haven't met a soul in years..."
"I've stared into the abyss of truth, and some things just can't be unseen."
"You can only be in one place at one time, but you can be at many times in a single place."
"It's rather silly to think that just one girl can change your whole entire world - but when love means that much to you, it's a simple matter, really. The heart is an incredibly fragile organ. When you wager everything on a single bet, it's all too easy to lose it all. But that's the thrill of the game, and I wouldn't have played it any other way."
"The point of all discussion is whether or not you agree with the argument, not whether or not you agree with the conclusion."
"The list of things to do tomorrow is always longer than the list of things done today."
"People will try to tell you truths that they've learned, and pass it off as wisdom, but the only truth I've learned is that everybody's truths are different, and the only wisdom is realizing that people need support more than they need guidance."
"Time heals all wounds, but some scars last forever."
"Religion is a blindness of spiritual sight."
"Here's a good philosophy for life: live your life such that if a version of you ten or more years ago were to meet you, they'd be totally blown away by what you've become."
"We are born with the wings of angels, but as we grow, the world twists and torments our souls into wicked and demonic shapes. The purity of innocence gives way to perversion in the form of knowledge."
"I don't vote because I don't believe that any realistic change in politics will significantly increase the quality of my life."
"Hell is a journey, and only those who never reach the end suffer for eternity. So if you find yourself in Hell, keep moving."
"Everything looks better in the dark."
"I find that being tired is a necessary, however not sufficient, condition for sleep..."
"Life is a recess from the absolute void, the eternal darkness. The Gatekeeper lets us each out to play in the yard for a brief period, and all the while, Death is standing by, watching, waiting for the time to bring us each in. Society is just the game we play to keep ourselves busy. Well I don't wanna play that game. I wanna play a different game, but I've got noone to play with. So I sit huddled in the corner of the yard, all alone, searching for a hole in the fence. Because I don't like it here, but I don't want to go back into the house."
"The trouble with art is that it's not compatible with supply-and-demand. Good art is not necessarily popular art, and vice-versa. It is not unusual for a good artist to starve for lack of recognition while a popular artist, whose art is not as good, gets all the encouragement he needs to survive and keep producing more art."
"Criticism always weighs heavier than praise, for it confirms our own self-defeating suspicions."
"I have an interest in certain religious ideas, but I don't actually believe any of them. Why? Well, I love fantasy, but I don't mistake it for reality."
"So many people think they know so much about so much, when they really know very little about very little."
"Better to have rumours started about you that aren't true, than to have to keep hidden secrets about yourself that are true."
"Most dreams that are forgotten, are forgettable. And the ones that stick, they stick for a reason."
"The most arrogant idea that man has ever put forth is the idea that he was created in God's image."
"It's hard to fight a battle when you're not quite sure where the battlefield is."
"A true companion is someone who understands and accepts your faults which are misunderstood by most others."
"Moods pass, but habits stick around."
"Live life and love."
"So long as there is unpredictability, there will never be complete control, and without control, there can be no perfect justice."
"What's amazing in life is not the dreams people have before they are shattered by cold, hard reality, but the feats that some people manage to accomplish still, under the unrelenting oppression of the here and now."
"Choice is but the illusion of a world where events unfold differently than they actually will."
"Cupid's arrow has only one barb."
"Life is like being stuck on an island in the middle of a river, and being forced to choose a side of the river to escape to...except that when you make that decision, you find that there's no bridge, and the water is teaming with hungry piranha."
"The funny thing about theory is...it often doesn't work in practice."
"Physical law (as written by humans) is like computer software that needs an infinite number of patches to work properly."
"Looks aren't everything, but they are something."
"Knowledge is the candle which repels the darkness of fear."
"Do not think I am a prude. If I am repressed, it is not because of my beliefs, but because of my inhibitions."
"I've never been fond of people telling me what to believe in, spiritually. If you have to be told what to believe in, then maybe you should step back and ask yourself just what the point of your existence is. Is it to fulfill somebody else's objective, and submit to the labels other people place on you? Or is it to discover just who you truly are? Know thyself. It is the only genuine pursuit."
"In this day and age of heavy makeup and cosmetic surgery, it's really not unusual to fall in love with a carefully painted and perfectly molded piece of plastic."
"People have a natural habit of generalizing their problems to such abstraction that the true issue becomes lost and avoided, which is - perhaps subconsciously - the goal to begin with. It's a distraction reflex."
"The magic of Tarot is not in the cards, it's in the mind. The cards don't tell you anything, it is your reaction to them that uncovers the truth."
"I am a pagan. I do not believe in Satan. I do not believe in God, either. I worship the sun and the moon, the passing of the seasons, the circle of life. They are my gods."
"A remake is a crappy sequel with the tenacity to claim the title of the original."
"'The only people who never fail are those who never try.' That's why I've given up trying."
"Just because a law is written in a book somewhere, that doesn't mean it has any dominion whatsoever over my soul."
"Nudism is not about seeing, it's about being."
"The only dress code I respect is 'clothing optional'."
"The simplest things in life can save you or destroy you."
"In my perfect world, I am able to sleep in as long as I want, every day. No matter where I go, I wear what I feel like, even if it's nothing at all. For every single meal, I can choose any dish in the world, even if I decide to choose the same thing over and over. It's always comfortably warm when I'm up and about, and refreshingly cool when I climb into bed. I never get sick or injured. ..."
"My physics degree taught me that 1) God plays dice, and 2) the dice are fixed."
"I was an ambitious youth. The secrets of the universe intrigued me. I studied physics, but then I learned that they are secrets for a reason."
"If you don't push the boundaries, how will you ever know how far you could have gotten?"
"Life is a road trip. The destination is fixed, but the path is entirely up to you. No matter which way you go, you'll end up in the same place. Never pass up a road that calls out to you."
"They say you've got to play the game, well I'm reinventing the rules; and they may say I'm bound to lose, but I know they're all fools."
"The most important step toward accomplishing something is committing yourself to it."
"Frustratingly, my best thinking is done at times when it's not convenient to record my thoughts - when I'm lying in bed trying to fall asleep, and when I'm in the shower."
"You can learn a lot by questioning your assumptions."
"Professionalism is a state of mind, not a set of rules."
"Rules were created to serve man, and not vice versa."
"Lying to protect one's image only degrades it further."
"One good seed is ruined by a poisonous apple."
"A demon that feeds on lesser demons is no less of a demon itself."
"Logic is my faith, and reason is my god."
"The mind need not confine itself to the boundaries of the flesh."
"Liberty is not compatible with justice for all."
"I have the strength to build the bars, but I have not the strength to break them."
"Things don't happen for a reason, they happen because of a reason."
"If death is an eternal, dreamless sleep, then the tragedy of dying is not the loss of life, but having to sacrifice one's dreams."
"Death is preferable to life, but living is easier than dying."
"A good piece of art stands out from the crowd; it captures your attention. But a great piece of art draws you in, and gets better and better the more you look at it."
"I'm not as afraid of the thought of bad things happening, as I am of the thought of good things not happening."
"To worship Satan is to misunderstand him."
"Good art grabs your attention. Great art holds onto it."
"You either 'get' naked, or you don't."
"There's no use going to the butcher to get bandages."
"Think with your mind; act with your heart."
"The only approval that matters is my own."
"One of the fundamental truths about life is that life isn't fair. Justice, like so many things, is a fabrication of the human imagination."
"Happiness is more important than art, anyway. The only reason artists create art is because they've failed at being happy."
"Life is a joke. And not a funny joke, either - a sick joke. But you still have to laugh just the same. Or else it's bound to drive you insane."
"God is an extraneous concept."
"The only way to make it in this world is through prostitution. If not prostitution of the body, then of the mind: ideals, principles, philosophies, whatever it takes..."
"Sweet dreams give way to waking nightmares."
"Don't ever try to change the world. You're the only one who'll be changed in the end..."
"Those who can't do, critique."
"Nobody will take care of you for you."
"Love without lust is merely friendship."
"Everyone in the world can hate you, but the only thing that *really* matters is whether you like yourself."
"Some people say that the existence of God can neither be proven nor disproven. It is a little known fact that God's existence *has* been disproved. In fact, the nonexistence of God is self-evident among the language of logic. The reason people still cling to God is that it is not logic but faith that propels them to trust in God. But what is faith but obstinate attachment to an idea that is familiar? Do you really want to put your moral compass in the hands of a person who is so eager to throw logic out the window in defense of his/her beliefs?"
"God is a concept for children. Just as we invent Santa Claus as a tool to encourage good behavior, we use God to ground our moral beliefs in a form that is simple enough for a child to understand. But it is a part of growing up to cast off these childish fictions, to understand the methods and reasons behind them, and to face the more complex truth with a more sophisticated understanding. To cling to these fictitious beliefs is nothing more than childishness and a reluctance to grow up."
"I'd rather be remembered in a book, or by my accomplishments, than on a gravestone."
"If I find myself walking a bad path, all I can do is follow it to the end."
"Never be content; with what you have, with where you're at, with who you are."
"I don't know who created this thing called life, but surely he was a madman."
"All love is tragedy."
"Suffering is the body's method of preparing for joy."
"There are examiners, and there are practitioners."
"The unexamined life is not worth living; but the unpracticed life simply is not."
"You can't change minds - only heads."
"Fantasy is not the master, but the servant of Man's desire."
"The difference between a defender of free speech and a censor is not in the words they speak, but in the words they allow to be spoken."
"Let emotion lead your life, but let rationality lead your arguments."
"It is better to die for your country in old age, than in youth on a battlefield."
"There are two kinds of people in this world: those who are generally fine and/or accepting of the state the world is in, and those who are not."
"It is human nature to push the boundaries of acceptability. Otherwise, how would we know the expanse of the playing field?"
"The only bad publicity is the kind that lands you in jail."
"True evil lies not in the act of committing sin, but in the act of accusing those who do. After all, Satan is known as 'The Accuser'. God, on the other hand, practices forgiveness - the act from which true goodness springs."
"There are no inappropriate thoughts; only inappropriate behaviors."
"It is no less cruel to force an unwanted child to live than it is to exterminate it before it even has the capacity for complex reasoning and self-awareness - in fact, I would argue that it is much crueler. Even if life is a 'miracle', then there is no shortage of such miracles, and indeed, it would be ludicrous to suggest that every 'potential' miracle be actualized. Conception is not in God's hands, we may as well take the choice of raising a child (or not) into our own."
"Decency is a privilege, not a right. It is something to be agreed upon by mutually compassionate parties, not something to be forced by one onto an unwilling other."
"Punishing good will breeds contempt."
"The purpose of the justice system is to defend, not to punish."
"Society can never eliminate crime. The purpose of laws is not to discourage crime, but to reduce the harmful effects of crime, and in some cases, to allow society to proft from the crime, at the expense of the criminal."
"It is not sufficient simply to shift paradigms, they must be shattered."
"The proper method of preventing crime is not punishing criminals before they act, but removing the desire to commit the crime."
"If you believe in freedom, then you must allow some men to choose evil. And if you believe in privacy, then you must allow some men to hide their crimes. This is the price, and it is non-negotiable."
"One man's gimmick is another man's flourish."
"It is the Maiden's responsibility to bear pleasure. It is the Mother's responsibility to bear child."
"'Practice makes perfect' is fine for optimists, but nobody is truly perfect; thus it's an impossible goal to strive for. A more realistic reading would yield, 'practice improves performance'."
"The impact of the extraordinary is enhanced by the presence of the ordinary."
"You can't buy time, but you can spend it freely."
"The creative arts are a lot like fishing, you gotta sit around for a long time before you catch a bite, and when you do, you gotta tug with all your might."
"A person grows older, but people stay the same age. There will never come a day when everyone has grown up."
"If I must be chained, I would rather have my body than my mind restrained."
"Keep in mind: there will always be those who disapprove, no matter what you do."
"Fantasy is god's apology for reality."
"The battlefield is not the only place where brave men and women fight and die to defend our freedom."
"Sex is not a battle. It is a communion."
"Acceptable crime prevention includes diffusing the motivations a person might have to commit a crime, NOT punishing people for crimes that have not been committed."
"I don't like to be labelled, because it just encourages stereotyping. And I have yet to find a stereotype that describes me."
"Self-knowledge is the root of wisdom."
"If somebody tells you you're doing something wrong, that means you're doing something right."
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